Brownfields Assessment Grant

Overview

The City of Montrose has received a $300,000 Brownfield Area-Wide Assessment Grant from the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The grant will be used to complete environmental site assessments on underutilized properties, cleanup planning, and community outreach. The city receives the grant on the heels of completing a 2014 EPA Brownfield Area-Wide Assessment Grant for $400,000 that enabled the city to complete Phase I and II environmental assessments on properties in the Uncompahgre River corridor and downtown. The 2017 grant will be targeted for properties along the Uncompahgre River, portions of downtown, and along North Townsend Avenue.

Partners

The city has enlisted a partner in this effort, the United States Environmental Protection Agency or EPA. The EPA has a national program that provides grant support to communities like Montrose to address redevelopment goals and plans that may be hindered in areas where historic activities have left behind remnants of contamination.

Ayres Associates, Inc. was selected through the city’s procurement process to be the consultant for the 2017 brownfields grant.

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Incentivizing Economic Development

Brownfield Area-Wide Assessment Grants are provided to communities to evaluate the unknown environmental conditions of underutilized properties and to formulate a plan for their cleanup, if necessary, and redevelopment. Reducing environmental threats to the public’s health and welfare is a priority of the program.

Site assessments foster redevelopment and economic growth by lifting the cloud of uncertainty surrounding properties that are perceived to be contaminated. Developers and businesses are unlikely to redevelop a brownfield site when they have concerns about environmental contamination.

The city has benefitted from the 2014 brownfields grant. Sharing Ministries Food Bank and Storm King Distilling Co. are located on properties that were assessed and determined to have easily managed environmental issues under the grant. Properties that are cleared for redevelopment become more marketable. When brownfield redevelopment occurs, blight is eliminated, new jobs are created, the tax base is increased, and other development in the area is likely to occur.

This grant will be utilized to support the Montrose Urban Renewal Authority (MURA) development and to strengthen the downtown by incentivizing revitalization. The MURA development will bring a mixture of commercial and retail businesses, restaurants, residential construction, and open space. The downtown is the core of Montrose. A healthy downtown is essential for the vitality of the community.

About the EPA Brownfields Program

The EPA Brownfields Program empowers states, communities, and other stakeholders to work together to prevent, assess, safely clean up, and sustainably reuse brownfields. A brownfield site is real property, the expansion, redevelopment, or reuse of which may be complicated by the presence or potential presence of a hazardous substance, pollutant, or contaminant.